The distribution of pesticide-poisoning symptoms for various
categories of farmers based on their years of experience in
spraying operations is presented in Figure 1. The percentage
of farmers demonstrating each symptom and their number of
years of involvement in spraying operations (ie, years of exposure
were generally directly proportionate) is shown. The
highest percentage of farmers demonstrating each pesticidepoisoning
symptom was always among the group that had
been involved in insecticide application for 20 years and
above. For example, 71% of that group complained of excessive
sweating while only 7% of the group involved in
insecticide operations for less than 10 years gave similar
complaints.